Digital broadcast receiver and backup method

ABSTRACT

A digital broadcast receiver capable of reducing time and labor to back-up contents recorded on one recording medium to another recording medium. A digital broadcast receiver extracts the contents recorded, out of order, on a first recording medium by an extracting unit according to the titles or genres recorded in a content list, and automatically rearranges the extracted contents using an arranging unit according to video-recording date-and-hour recorded in the content list, for recording as a content list onto a second recording medium ( 300 ).

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present invention relates to a digital broadcast receiver forreceiving a digital broadcast and a backup method for backing up acontent recorded on a recording medium to another recording medium.

BACKGROUND ART

Amid the advancement of television broadcast digitalization includingJapanese terrestrial broadcast digitalization targeted at 2003, thereare recent advents of hard disk audio/video recording apparatuses(AVHDD), digital video recorders (D-VHS) and the like, to record digitalbroadcasts. These apparatuses are connectable with a digital broadcastreceiver by an IEEE1394 (Institute of Electrical and ElectronicsEngineers 1394) terminal, which can record the digital broadcastreceived by a digital broadcast receiver.

Meanwhile, there is a recent advent of a digital broadcast receiverincorporating an AVHDD for video recording. Generally, the AVDHHtemporarily stores contents and thereafter backs up a user-selectedcontent onto a D-VHS digital videotape.

However, in the above method, manual operation must be made in order toback up related ones of recorded contents, making it difficult to findout a related recorded content. Also, in the case that the capacity of arecording medium reaches a limit in the course of backup, backup isended at that time.

The present invention has been made in view of such points, and it is anobject to provide a digital broadcast receiver capable of automaticallybacking up related ones of recorded contents.

Also, another object of the invention is to provide a backup methodcapable of automatically backing up related contents.

DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION

The present invention provides, in order to solve the above problem, ina digital broadcast receiver for receiving a digital broadcast, adigital broadcast receiver characterized by comprising: extracting meansfor automatically extracting a plurality of contents recorded, out oforder, on a recording medium by a first attribute of the contents; andarranging means for automatically rearranging contents extracted by theextracting means according to a second attribute of extracted contents,for recording onto a second recording medium.

Herein, the digital broadcast receiver of the invention has theextracting means and the arranging means, to automatically arranges,with relations, the contents recorded out of order on the recordingmedium, for recording onto another recording medium.

Meanwhile, there is provided in a backup method for backing up contentsrecorded on a first recording medium onto a second recording medium, abackup method characterized by: automatically extracting contentsrecorded, out of order, on the first recording medium according to afirst attribute of the contents; and automatically rearranging extractedcontents according to a second attribute of the extracted contents, forrecording onto a second recording medium.

Herein, the contents recorded on the first recording medium areextracted, according to the first attribute, of related contents whichare rearranged according to the second attribute and backed up onto asecond recording medium, whereby related contents are automaticallybacked up to another recording medium.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a principle diagram showing a principle of the presentinvention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a digital broadcast receiver of theinvention and its peripheral units.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a backup method.

FIG. 4 is an example of a screen to be displayed on a display of adigital television set when moved to a backup mode.

FIG. 5 is an example of displaying a list of the contents recorded on anAVHDD, on the display of the digital television set.

FIG. 6 is an example of a screen to be displayed on the display of thedigital television set when selecting a classification of contents.

FIG. 7 is an example of a screen to be displayed on the display of thedigital television set when selecting a backup destination.

FIG. 8 is a figure showing a manner that contents have been extracted ontitle from a content list recorded in the AVDHH shown in FIG. 4 andbacked up to a D-VHS.

FIG. 9 is an example of displaying a fact that the tape remaining amountof a D-VHS digital tape is deficient, on the display of the digitaltelevision set.

FIG. 10 is a figure showing a manner of backing up the contents recordedon AVHDD and D-VHS digital video tapes to another D-VHS digital videotape.

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION

Hereunder, an embodiment of the present invention will be explained withreference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a principle diagram of the invention.

A digital broadcast receiver 100 of the invention comprises extractingmeans 100 a for automatically extracting the contents recorded, out oforder, in a first recording medium 200 by the titles or genres recordedin a content list 200 a, and arranging means 100 b for automaticallyrearranging the extracted contents according to the video-recordingdate-and-hour recorded in the content list 200 a and recording as acontent list 300 a to a second recording medium 300.

By the configuration as in the above, the digital broadcast receiver 100of the invention can extract, by the extracting means 100 a, thecontents recorded, out of order, in the first recording medium 200 onthe basis of each title or genre recorded in the content list 200 a, andautomatically rearrange, by the arranging means 100 b, the extractedcontents according to the recording date-and-time recorded in thecontent list 200 a and automatically record as a content list 300 a tothe second recording medium 300.

Next, a concrete embodiment of the invention is explained.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a digital broadcast receiver of anembodiment of the invention and its peripheral unit.

A digital broadcast receiver 10 of the embodiment of the inventioncomprises a front end 10 b connected to an external antenna 20 andincluding a not-shown tuner and the like, a back end 10 d connected tothe front end 10 b and including a not-shown decoder or the like to havea function to output a video signal and audio signal to a digitaltelevision set (not shown), an AVHDD 10 c as an integration-type harddisk drive connected to a data line between the front end 10 b and theback end 10 d, a remote-control light-receiving section 10 e forreceiving a signal from a remote-control transmitter 40, and a CPU(Central Processing Unit) 10 a connected, through a bus 10 f, to thefront end 10 b, the back end 10 d, the AVHDD 10 c and the remote-controllight-receiving section 10 e.

The output of the digital broadcast receiver 10 is supplied to anot-shown digital television set, where a required image is displayed onits display.

Meanwhile, at the outside of the digital broadcast receiver 10, thereare two digital videos D-VHS 30 a and D-VHS 30 b connected in adaisy-chain type through a signal line, e.g. of IEEE1394 format, to takeout and record the digital broadcast data existing in a transport streamform between the front end 10 b and the back end 10 d.

By making such a configuration, the CPU 10 a recognizes a title, genreand video-recording date-and-hour of a content recorded in the recordingmedium of the D-VHS 30 a, 30 b connected via the AVHDD 10 c and IEEE1394terminal by an application program stored in a not-shown ROM (Read OnlyMemory). Furthermore, such operations are made possible that, forexample, reference is made to a genre to automatically take a drama outamong the contents recorded, out of order, in the AVHDD 10 c and arrangeand backup it in a video-recording date-and-hour order to a digitalvideotape of the D-VHS 30 a.

Incidentally, although, in the above explanation, the connection formsof the recording units based on the AVHDD 10 c and D-VHS 30 a, 30 b areof the daisy-chain type, various connection forms may be taken includinga star type, tree type and the like. Meanwhile, there is no limitationin respect of connection length and connection count.

Hereunder, a method of backup is explained.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a method of backup. Incidentally, S1, S2,. . . in FIG. 3 show process step numbers.

Explanation is made, below, on each of steps separately.

S1: selecting a backup source.

The user notifies the digital broadcast receiver 10 of a move to abackup mode, by using the remote-control transmitter 40 for example.

FIG. 4 is a screen example to be displayed, at that time, on a displayof the digital television set. On the display, displayed are AVHDD 10 cbuilt in the digital broadcast receiver 10, and “AVHDD”, “D-VHS(1)” and“D-VHS(2)” as machine names of the D-VHS 30 a, 30 b connected by theIEE1394.

Also, displayed is a list button to list-display the titles of thecontents recorded in the respective recording mediums. Next, a cursor(underline) is moved by using the remote control 40, to select of whichrecording medium a content is to be backed up. Furthermore, the listbutton is selected to instruct for list display.

Herein, explanation is made on an example of a process within thedigital broadcast receiver 10 to be executed in step S1, with referenceto FIG. 2.

In case the user operates the remote control transmitter 40 to send asignal for moving to a backup mode, the CPU 10 a recognizes the AVHDD 10c as an incorporated hard disk and the D-VHS 30 a and D-VHS 30 bconnected by the IEE1394 from a signal received through theremote-control light-receiving section 10 e on the basis of anapplication program stored in a not-shown ROM or the like, and, at thesame time, recognizes the content recorded in the AVHDD 10 c and thecontent recorded in the D-VHS 30 a and D-VHS 30 b. A recognition resultis added to a content now under reproduction by the back end 10 d andoutputted onto the digital television set as in FIG. 4.

The CPU 10 a receives a signal through the remote-controllight-receiving section 10 e each time the user uses the remote-controltransmitter 40, and carries out a predetermined operation according toan application program depending upon an input by the user, to output aresult thereof onto the not-shown digital television set through theback end 10 d. This operation is similar also in the below step, andhence omitted.

S2: displaying a video-record list recorded.

Herein, the list of contents recorded in the recording medium at thebackup source designated in step S1 is displayed on the display of thedigital television set.

FIG. 5 is an example displaying the list of contents recorded in theAVHDD 10 c on the display of the digital television set. As in thefigure, there are displayed titles, genres, video-recordingdate-and-hour in the list. Such a list has been recorded as a contentlist on each recording medium.

Meanwhile, on the digital-television screen shown in FIG. 5, there aredisplayed the buttons of “Delete” and “Backup”, for example. The user,if selecting “Delete” by the remote-control transmitter 40, is allowedto select and delete, for example, a content to be deleted in the list.Selecting “Backup” proceeds to step S3.

S3: selecting an attribute for content extraction.

FIG. 6 is an example of a screen to be displayed on thedigital-television display when the user selects “Backup” in step S2.Herein, the user determines which attribute of title or genre thecontent is to be classified and extracted, and makes a selection by theremote-control transmitter 40. In FIG. 6, “Classify by Title” isselected.

In the case of selecting title, as shown in FIG. 6, the user then inputsa title name by the remote-control transmitter 40. The CPU 10 a searchesthrough the content list of the recording medium selected in step S1 andextracts a content meeting the title name.

Meanwhile, in the case of selecting genre, then the user selects a genrename, such as sport, drama or animation, by the remote-controltransmitter 40. The CPU 10 a searches through a content list of therecording medium selected in step S1 according to a selected genre name,and extracts a content meeting the genre name.

The information of the extracted content is temporarily stored to arecording unit such as a not-shown RAM, in preparatory for backup.

S4: selecting a backup destination.

FIG. 7 shows an example of a screen to be displayed on a digitaltelevision display when selecting a backup destination. As in thefigure, there is shown a machine name of the AVHDD 10 c or the D-VHS 30a, 30 b, so that the user selects any one by the remote-controltransmitter 40.

S5: examining for an available disk capacity of the backup destination.

The CPU 10 a examines for an available disk capacity of a recordingmedium as a backup destination selected in step S4. In case theavailable disk capacity is sufficient, step S6 is proceeded to, while,in case deficient, step S7 is proceeded to.

S6: executing backup.

Because, in step S5, the backup destination the user has designated issufficient in available disk capacity, the content extracted from thebackup-destination recording medium selected in step S1 by the attributeselected in step S3 is automatically recorded in a video-recordingdate-and-hour order onto the backup-destination recording mediumdesignated in step S4, thus ending the backup operation.

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing a manner at a time that a content isextracted by title from the content list recorded on the AVHDD 10 cshown in FIG. 5 and backed up to the D-VHS 30 a. In the case that atitle is selected as attribute in step S3 to input “AB” for example, thecontent meeting the title is automatically arranged in a video-recordingdate-and-hour order to the backup-destination recording mediumdesignated in step S4, herein D-VHS 30 a, thus being recorded as in thefigure.

S7: displaying an alarm.

Because the backup-destination recording medium designated by the userin step S5 was confirmed insufficient in available disk capacity, anindication of that fact is displayed on the digital television display.

FIG. 9 is an example that the fact a digital tape of the D-VHS 30 a isinsufficient in tape remaining amount is displayed on the digitaltelevision display. In the figure, the process to be next done is shownfour simultaneously with an alarm text.

S8: selecting the next process.

The user selects any one among, for example, the four processes shown inFIG. 9.

For example, in the case of selecting another apparatus (S8 a), step S5is again returned to, to examine for an available disk capacity of aunit the user has selected.

In the case of selecting to continue backup (S8 b), there is apossibility that the disk capacity run out in the course of backup.However, backup operation is continued as it is, to end the process at atime the disk capacity runs out.

At this time, an error message may be displayed.

In the case that selection is to format and execute backup (S8 c), therecording medium designated in step S4 is formatted to execute backup,and thereafter the process is ended.

In the case of selecting to suspend backup (S8 d), backup operation issuspended to end the process.

As described above, by automatically extracting and rearranging thecontents according to a content attribute recorded in a recordingmedium, the user is released from the troublesomeness of manualoperation and allowed to back up, in a brief time, a content of a genreor title he or she seeks, in a recording date-and-hour order, ontoanother recording medium.

Incidentally, the above explained with one backup-destination recordingmedium, this is not limited to.

FIG. 10 is a diagram showing a manner that the contents recorded on tworecording mediums, or digital videotapes of the AVHDD 10 c and D-VHS 30a, are backed up to one recording medium, or a digital video tape of theD-VHS 30 b. For example, dramas can be extracted from the contentsrecorded on the AVHDD 10 c and D-VHS 30 a and backed up to in avideo-recording date-and-hour order onto the D-VHS 30 b.

Meanwhile, although, in the above explanation, a backup-destinationrecording medium was selected by the user, selection may be madeautomatically. On this occasion, the digital broadcast receiver examinesfor a content capacity an available storage capacity of a recordingmedium for backup, and selects an optimal destination of backup.

Meanwhile, although, in the above explanation, the digital broadcastreceiver controls backup operation and instructs an backup operation toanother recording medium, the unit other than the digital broadcastreceiver, such as the AVHDD or D-VHS, may control backup operation tooperate the other unit or recording medium.

As explained in the above, in the present invention, the digitalbroadcast receiver has means that recognizes a content attributerecorded on a recording medium, and automatically extracts andrearranges the contents recorded, out of order, in the recording mediumaccording to the attribute thereby backing up them to another recordingmedium. Accordingly, the user is allowed to carry out backup withreduced time and labor.

Meanwhile, in the method of backup in the invention, because contentsare automatically extracted and rearranged according to a contentattribute recorded on a recording medium and backed up to anotherrecording medium, the user is released from the troublesomeness ofmanual operation and the user can carry out backup with reduced time andlabor.

1. A digital broadcast receiver comprising: storing means for storing aplurality of contents of a digital broadcast, and storing attributes ofthe contents on a first recording medium, wherein the stored attributesof the contents include a genre name of each content and a title name ofeach content; extracting means for automatically extracting contentsfrom a plurality of the contents recorded out of a video-recordingdate-and-hour order on the first recording medium based on a user-inputattribute input by a user, wherein, when the user-input attribute is agenre name of the content, extracting means extracts the content havingthe same genre name as the genre name input by the user, and when theuser-input attribute is a title name of the content, extracting meansextracts the content having the same title name as the title name inputby the user; and selecting means for selecting a second recordingmedium; examining means for examining for an available disk capacity ofthe second recording medium and for determining whether the availabledisk capacity of the second recording medium is sufficient for contentsextracted by the extracting means; arranging means for automaticallyrearranging the extracted contents, recorded out of the video-recordingdate-and-hour order and meeting the user-input attribute, in thevideo-recording date-and-hour order without a user's manual operation,for recording onto the second recording medium, when the available diskcapacity of the second recording medium is sufficient, wherein thevideo-recording date-and-hour indicates when the extracted content isrecorded.
 2. The digital broadcast receiver according to claim 1,wherein the digital broadcast receiver has a plurality of recordingmedia; and wherein the extracting means automatically extracts aplurality of contents from said plurality of recording media.
 3. Thedigital broadcast receiver according to claim 1, further comprising:displaying means for displaying said plurality of contents extracted bysaid particular genre or title input by user.
 4. The digital broadcastreceiver according to claim 1, wherein one or both of the recordingmedia is a hard disk.
 5. The digital broadcast receiver according toclaim 1, wherein one or both of the recording media is a digitalvideotape.
 6. A method for backing up contents recorded on a firstrecording medium onto a second recording medium comprising: storing aplurality of contents of a digital broadcast on the first recordingmedium; storing attributes of the contents on the first recordingmedium, wherein the stored attributes of the contents include a genrename of each content and a title name of each content; automaticallyextracting contents from a plurality of the contents recorded out of avideo-recording date-and-hour order on the first recording medium, basedon a user-input attribute input by a user, wherein, when the user-inputattribute is a genre name of the content, extracting means extracts thecontent having the same genre name as the genre name input by the user,and when the user-input attribute is a title name of the content,extracting means extracts the content having the same title name as thetitle name input by the user; and selecting a second recording medium;examining for an available disk capacity of the second recording medium;determining whether the available disk capacity of the second recordingmedium is sufficient for contents extracted by the extracting means;automatically rearranging the extracted contents, recorded out of thevideo-recording date-and-hour order and meeting the user-inputattribute, in the video-recording data-and-hour order without a user'smanual operation, for recording onto the second recording medium, whenthe available disk capacity of the second recording medium issufficient, wherein the video-recording date-and-hour indicates when theextracted content is recorded.
 7. The backup method according to claim6, wherein the contents recorded on a plurality of recording media areextracted according to particular genre or title input by user,rearranged according to video-recording data-and-hour and recorded ontoone of plurality of recording media.
 8. The backup method according toclaim 6, wherein, during recording the contents onto the secondrecording medium, in the case that the storage capacity of the secondrecording medium reaches a limit, selected contents are recorded onto athird recording medium.
 9. The backup method according to claim 6,further comprising: displaying said plurality of contents recorded onsaid second recording medium.
 10. The digital broadcast receiveraccording to claim 1, further comprising: one or more back-updestination recording media adapted to store the contents, wherein thedigital broadcast receiver determines an optimal one of the one or moreback-up destination recording media based on available storage capacityof the one or more back-up destination recording media.
 11. The digitalbroadcast method according to claim 6, further comprising: determiningan optimal one or more back-up destination recording media based onavailable storage capacity of the one or more back-up destinationrecording media.